As the Occupy Wall Street protests have gained momentum overthe last few weeks, many have pointed out that the protesters' anger is directed at the wrong people . Critics of the movement, while understanding the frustration of the demonstrators, contend that their focus should be on a number of othersources: the Federal Reserve, for instance, and also the elected officials who continue tosupport government intervention in the free market and to pick and choose winners via regulations and the “toobig to fail” philosophy.
Meanwhile, Wall Street isalready gearing up to buy off another round ofelected officials, solidifying the very collusion between Wall Street and the federal government that has both Occupy Wall Street protesters and their critics concerned.
The Center for Responsive Politics recently posted data regarding the financial contributions of Wall Street firms to each presidential contender’s campaign for the 2012 elections.
According to the data, Mitt Romney (pictured above) has received the most donations from Goldman Sachs — nearly$400,000 to date. The next closest is President Obama with $49,000, followed by Tim Pawlenty, Jon Huntsman,Rick Perry, and Ron Paul,the latter of whom received just $2,500 from the company.
Goldman Sachs was a significant supporter of candidate Obama’s 2008 campaign — with contributions of almost one million dollars. In 2010, CNN reported, “According to Federal Election Commission figures compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics, Goldman Sachs’ political action committee and individual contributors who listed the company as their employer donated $994,795 during 2007 and 2008 toObama’s presidential campaign, the second-highest contribution from a company PAC andcompany employees.”
Other key Wall Street contributors to the 2012 campaign include Morgan Stanley, Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, and Citigroup. Thecontributions from each donor have several consistent patterns. First,the top two recipients ofeach of the banks' donations are Mitt Romney and Barack Obama, with the exception of Tim Pawlenty in the case of Morgan Stanley, who surpasses President Obama but not Romney. In all, Romney has raised13 times more money than any other candidate.
Additionally, Ron Paul receives the least amount of campaign contributions from nearly all top Wall Street banks, with the exception of Morgan Stanley and Bank of America. Not a single bank has donated more than $6,000 to his campaign.
A summary of the total number of donations from Wall Street firms per candidate is as follows:
Mitt Romney: $813,300
Barack Obama: $198,874
Tim Pawlenty: $101,515
Rick Perry: $58,900
Jon Huntsman: $28,250
Ron Paul: $13,104
Herman Cain: $2,715
Michele Bachmann:$1,500
Newt Gingrich: $1,250
Significant bank contributions to President Obama’s campaign certainly undermine any assertions that he is in fact not guilty of big bank/Wall Street collusion. And this is no new trend. In 2008, Wall Street’s big banks were all significant contributors to the Obama campaign. Besides the million or so dollars received by Goldman Sachs, Obama’s campaign also posted over $800,000 in contributions from JP Morgan Chase, nearly$750,000 from Citigroup,and over $500,000 from Morgan Stanley.

The candidate with the most money almost always wins. The establishment is almost always able to pick the candidates that they want, and the rest of us are often left with tryingto choose between “the lesser of two evils.”

Bailout-Payback!